Council addressed mine studies peer review and Stormwater Master Plan among other topics at their meeting on March 6, 2019

Home/News/Council addressed mine studies peer review and Stormwater Master Plan among other topics at their meeting on March 6, 2019

Council addressed mine studies peer review and Stormwater Master Plan among other topics at their meeting on March 6, 2019

Action Item

Council voted to terminate the appointment of Patty Whitehead as a member of the Design Review Board. It was stated that she had shown a lack of good judgement in posting crude and obscene comments regarding government officials on social media, which was a discredit to the Village.

Workshop

Mine Studies Peer Review

Bill Spikowski, Spikowski Planning Associates and consultant to the Village, gave a report on his peer review of mine reports including the Stuart and Waldrop studies.

He first described how mining for limestone lowers the water level or wetlands in the surrounding area, as well as the negative impacts to existing neighborhoods and wildlife. He stated that mining is the highest land use, when we should have a balance of land use in the DRGR (Density Reduction Groundwater Resource) area where much of our drinking water supply comes from. Mining in the DRGR negatively impacts the downstream communities of Estero and Bonita Springs.

He pointed out that the Waldrop report was wrong in that it greatly overstates the need for limerock based on inaccurate population counts, under estimated the amount of limerock that can be produced from several current mines and didn’t include the mines located in adjacent Charlotte and Collier counties. (